


Sleep Doesn't Look Pleasant

by whambat



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Body Horror, Brief description of violence, Canon-Typical Horror, Gore, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, MAG161 spoilers, Skin picking, none of the prior 5 tags happen to our good good boys fear not, this episode made me sad but Not Sad Enough so i took things into my own hands, throwaway character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-07
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:27:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23532325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whambat/pseuds/whambat
Summary: "I couldn't wake you," Jon says. It's true, in a manner of speaking.The Archivist no longer sleeps, but despite his best efforts, he still finds a way to dream.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 6
Kudos: 60





	Sleep Doesn't Look Pleasant

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in a frenzy after 161 dropped so a chunk of this was guesswork not knowing how the world would look.
> 
> (The more alarming content warnings are all isolated in a single, skippable chunk of text. If you want angst without horror, feel free to skip the first large section of italics.)  
> 

Sleep had been a fraught subject for Jon in recent years. While his newfound sleeplessness is horrifying on an existential level, it means he no longer stalks through the dreams of statement givers, re-treading and reviving their old terrors as he powerlessly, hungrily watches. He can almost see it as a relief. Almost.

"Probably for the best," he says, trying to convince himself as much as Martin. "Sleep doesn't look… pleasant."

"No, it's-" Martin's voice breaks off. "It's not."

* * *

When Martin had fallen asleep for the first time after the change, Jon had watched over him. His presence was a comfort, and Jon expected they wouldn't have the opportunity for more moments of gentle repose any time soon. So he studied Martin's familiar face with a new urgency, the decade old acne scarring that had faded into barely noticeable discoloration around the nose, the soft curve of his cheeks, the eyelashes long and fluttering over dark circles—he was so tired— and he memorized the way they looked when Martin was at peace. A final nostalgic snapshot before he fully accepted the weight of what he'd done to the world.

For a few moments, it was enough to ground him in the quiet.

But not for long. The stillness in the cabin gave way to the noise of outside, howls and skitters and screeches and every noise that stands one's hair on end. As much as Jon _wanted_ to linger on Martin, to focus on him and try to block out what else there was to see, he felt the familiar draw to new stimulation, new information. He'd been like that since he was a kid, always seeking out what was novel or interesting, but now the urge to check and _look_ had a more sinister current to it.

That same current rushed in before Jon could tell whether his shift in attention was voluntary. Before, the prospect of Knowing had been limited to small trickles of information, water leaking in through the cracks in a door. Now that he'd opened that door, flung it off its hinges, it rolled in like the tide. He didn't drown, but the waves shook him as he waded through, left him unsteady, invited him to dive in.

_—A man is dying. His bright, young skin grows sallow and wrinkled, spotty and papery thin. His bones wither as he grows impossibly old, and older and older still. He slumps, then collapses as his bones refuse to hold him upright. He can feel all the aches and pains and weaknesses of old age setting in and compounding by the second, and he realizes with fresh horror that there is nothing particularly surprising about his predicament. He has always been dying. From the moment he was born, he has always been as good as dead. Still, he_ is _. A man is dying, and always will be.—_

_—A teenager sits in the ruins of a motel bathroom, bent over a large shard of broken mirror on the counter. They stare at their own reflection, picking methodically at blackheads, squeezing out the natural oils of their face in a vain attempt at normalcy. The skin picking was a coping mechanism, a compulsion that had distracted them from the thoughts and feelings they wanted to avoid. There are a lot more of those now. They squeeze and pinch at their pores until their skin is red and raw, expelling sebum and pus and blood in succession. They cannot stop. If they just keep at it, it has to run dry at some point, right? If they get it all out, they'll be clean again. Tears mix with the array of other septic fluids on their face as they pinch a nodule on their forehead. Something pops, spattering a curdled black substance onto the mirror. They shudder, wipe the mess off of the glass, and continue. Just a bit more—_

_—A woman clutches her old mp3 player from high school in her hand like a rosary. Every other device that could play music had died, but this one clicks on readily, despite the fact that it hasn't had a new battery in years. She knows it can't save her the way it used to, but she takes shaky hands and plugs in her earbuds, grateful for at least a momentary distraction. The song that plays was not in her library; she's certain of that. It beats and thrums like a racing heartbeat, pounding it's way to her very core and pulsing outwards in violent spasms. As she listens, her body settles into its rhythm, a frenzied dance alight with adrenaline. She doesn't remember picking up her desk lamp, but its weight is comforting in her hand. It feels heavy and tactile as it smashes into her husband's skull in time with the music. The lightbulb shatters with a sound like a high hat, high pitched and percussive and satisfying. She has not heard this song before, but she sings it word for word as she takes to the streets.—_

_Enough._ Jon collected himself, forced the images to the back of his mind. He focused again on Martin to find him stiff and rigid in the bed. His body shuddered slightly, but his limbs held tight in place. His eyes darted around under eyelids that were shut tight, and his breath came out in shallow, ragged gasps.

Martin had done so much to calm him in the intervening hours since the change, and so much of it had come down to the sensation of touch, soft nudges and gentle pressure and being held secure. It seemed right to return the favor. Jon's hands weren't soft like Martin's, though. His were rough with scarring and neglect (he couldn't bring himself to moisturize since his encounters with the Circus) and, Jon was sure, made his touch dry and unpleasant. Still, Martin had never complained, had held Jon's hands in his own with gentle affection. Jon placed a concerned hand on Martin's shoulder, almost daring to hope he could offer a shred of comfort. He looked at him with worry, and looked too hard.

_Martin is apart from the world. He does not know why. No one will explain to him why his schoolmates avoid him without any acknowledgement, parting and passing by him like rushing water around a rock. They leave him a wide berth, but do so with an apparent lack of awareness. He is shunned, but not noticed, not noticeable._

_No one says outright why he is everyone's last choice, when he is even chosen at all. In the absence of a clear explanation, he pieces together that there must be something wrong with him, some personal defect that he alone (always, always alone) is blind to. He cannot trust his perception, so he practices looking at himself through the eyes of others, a hard task when he is functionally invisible so much of the time. He tries instead to stop wanting. It doesn't work. It hurts._

_No one will tell him why his mother looks at him less and less over the years, even as he scrambles to support her. He remains at her side, but gradually she stops looking at him, starts seeing_ through _him until even his memory is something she shoos away from her thoughts. Eventually someone_ does _show him why, and he is forced to understand with crystal clarity. He can't bring himself to blame her._

Jon's head swam. In front of him, he still saw Martin, locked into fitful sleep, but he also Saw the messy, abstract narrative of pain and isolation unfolding in his mind. He wanted to speak, to tell Martin he wasn't alone. But Jon _felt_ almost as much as he saw, felt the same impenetrable barrier between himself and the rest of the world that Martin knew so intimately.

_For a brief time, he thinks maybe someone has seen him, known him, and not retreated or looked away. For the first time in years he allows himself to fully hope. When it is ripped away, he is reminded violently that he was never meant to have the same comfort and connection as others. He learns he cannot escape being this way, and tries again to embrace it. It still hurts, but a numbness gradually settles over him, easing the transition to further isolation._

_The source of his old hope returns against all odds, but it is too late. However well they may have known each other before, they were strangers now. He_ aches _to reach out, but doing so would erase months of work, opening old wounds that no amount of time alone could fully anesthetize. He chooses to stay away, and when he tries to change his mind at the last, the choice is made for him, separating him fully from the world he'd never truly been a part of._

Jon saw himself in Martin's dream. It wasn't _him_ the way it was when he wandered the nightmares of others, all eyes that shifted impossibly and watched with equal parts guilt and hunger. This Jon still looked human, and though its features were accurate and recognizable as his own, Martin's perception colored it with strokes of beauty and longing and loss.

Jon was struck with the conviction that he should not be seeing this. He wanted to yell or shake Martin awake or hold him close, wanted to bring these scenes of despair and gentle dread to an end, but his hand remained feather light and useless on Martin's shoulder, his eyes fixated, either unable or unwilling to look away. He had no right to watch Martin's private suffering, but that had never stopped him before, not with anyone else.

_The fog rolls in as he sits. The fear is constant but subdued, numbing him into complacency that keeps him from breaking the heavy silence. At first he thinks he hears a voice, dimly, far off. Nothing comes of it, though, and soon the silence is absolute. Time becomes meaningless in the certainty that Martin is at last where he was always meant to be._

The image of Martin's nightmare became still and unchanging, burning itself into Jon's mind. He wasn't sure how long they lay there, locked in involuntarily shared trauma. Time was trickier now.

Eventually, Martin's rigid body went limp all at once. He woke, breathing deep and heavy, and turned over in bed to bury his face in Jon's chest. His voiceless sobs pulsed a shaky rhythm through Jon's body. For all that he'd wanted to hold Martin before, it felt wrong to do so now. What right did Jon have to _comfort_ him, when he had allowed his suffering to continue, watched it all unfold?

Jon felt every bit the monster he was, felt the familiar guilt that urged him to distance himself for everyone else's sake. But that wasn't what Martin needed right now. Instead, Jon wrapped his arms around Martin and held tight, the embrace equal parts deception and penance.

* * *

"I couldn't wake you," Jon says. It's true, in a manner of speaking. But _couldn't_ is not the same as _tried._

"I'm sorry."

"It's not-" Jon falters. How could Martin think he had anything to apologize for? "You're not the one who ended the world."

A long pause stretches between them, and Martin finally shrugs. "Well, just as well I don't remember my dreams."

Jon grimaces.

"I do," he says. It's the closest thing he can muster to a confession.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are always welcome and appreciated!


End file.
